Atari-Amiga Deal
Introduction
At the 1983 AMOA show in New Orleans, Dave Morse meets Atari coin-op division President John Farrand. Discussions go well and that November a contract is signed.
Contract With Atari
On November 21st, Amiga and Atari sign a contract to use the Lorraine chipset for video game applications. Recipients are Dave Morse at Amiga and Mike Albaugh of Atari's coin-op division in Milpitas. Preliminary hardware specifications are included with the contract. During a budget meeting on December 20th, engineer Steve Bristow lists '1850 XL - 68000 based clones of Amiga game player system' in his log sheet of proposed computers.
Enter 1984
Atari and Amiga reconvene at the January CES in Las Vegas where Amiga are demonstrating their Lorraine computer prototype. On March 7th Atari deliver a $500,000 check to Amiga. Along with the check is a letter outlining previously discussed terms, which is signed by Dave Morse and John Farrand. A licensing agreement (LA) is expected to be signed at the end of June.
By April, Atari were working on their own version of the Amiga, codenamed Mickey.
A Way Out
While the original agreement allowed Atari to use the Lorraine chipset in coin-op or a home video game console, Atari are now talking about selling it as a computer. This would mean competing with Amiga. Amiga find this strong-armed attitude unacceptable and look for a way to get out of the contract. They feared that Atari would take everything if no reason was given.
An Unexpected Repayment
On June 29th, Dave Morse and Bill Hart call Atari to tell them they're on their way over to visit their headquarters at 1265 Borregas Avenue. Dave greets John Ferrand in the lobby and hands him a $750,000 check, a repayment of the original $500,000 plus interest. He says their chips don't work properly and that the Lorraine prototypes have been scrapped.
John is in shock and refuses to accept the check. Dave and Bill call their lawyer who gives them the following advice, "Leave the check on the table and walk out."
What Atari didn't know was that the money had been sent to Amiga from Commodore, who they had met with a day earlier.
